


Ink Him Into Me

by chemicalconcerto



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Angst, M/M, Pre-The Raven King, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-21
Updated: 2016-02-21
Packaged: 2019-10-10 12:58:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17426339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chemicalconcerto/pseuds/chemicalconcerto
Summary: Tumblr prompt: Adam has decided to get a tattoo, and brings Ronan with him.





	Ink Him Into Me

**Author's Note:**

> This was written before The Raven King was released, back when we had no idea what was going to happen with Gansey and Glendower. All we knew was that Gansey was going to die.

“You’re aware that it’s going to hurt, Parrish?” Ronan says.  “There  _will_  be pain involved.  You know, that, right?”

Adam is in the passenger seat of his own car.  Ronan drives, and the only reason the mixtape he made for Adam isn’t blaring at full volume from the shitty speakers is because Blue confiscated it for everyone’s safety, just like she did with the last one, and the one before that.  Adam is glad for the lack of gratuitous noise.  The hot summer wind rushes by the open windows, carrying the smell of cut grass and dust and exhaust, blowing pollen into Adam’s hair.

He forgets that Ronan has spoken until a hand grips the back of his neck.  It’s not like his father’s hand, hard and forceful.  Ronan’s touch is slow and easy, fingers worshiping the tendons under his skin and the soft hairs at the nape of his neck.

Ronan says, “Adam.”

Adam says, “I know.”

Ronan drives.

Adam says, “I’m not worried about the pain.  I just want it to be right.”

—

Later, when it’s all over, Adam lets Ronan inspect the image on the back of his neck, where Ronan’s hand had been before.  Ronan snaps a picture with his phone so Adam can see.

“Well,” Ronan says, hands in his pockets, “are you happy?”

_Are you happy now, Adam?_

“No,” Adam says, “but it’s what I wanted.”

They pay and head home.  Ronan drives, only because he’s stronger and likes to wrestle Adam’s keys away from him.  Lately, Adam lets him.

Back at the Barns, Ronan stops him and kisses him outside the farmhouse.  Dusk is falling, casting everything in shades of purple and blue.  A choir of crickets sing their approval of the soft, stolen moment.  When they’re left standing, holding on, breathing each other’s air, Adam asks the question that’s been lingering in his mind all day.

“Would he have liked it?”

Ronan doesn’t touch the new tattoo, but his hand slides up Adam’s back all the same, palm hot through Adam’s t-shirt.

“He liked everything about you,” Ronan says, which isn’t the kind of answer Adam wants.

Inside, while Matthew chatters over reheated pizza, and Chainsaw tears strips out of a phonebook containing only the address of Blue’s college in California, Adam sneaks a glance at the photo of his tattoo on Ronan’s phone again.

There is the back of his neck, and there are Ronan’s fingers holding down the collar of his t-shirt, and there is the stark black shape of the oyster-shell raven in the field outside Cabeswater, and there, wound through the lines of the bird, are Gansey’s last words.

_Non mortem._

_Somni fratrem._

_See you soon._


End file.
